Computer simulations reveal that a compound found on Saturn’s largest moon may be able to form a freeze-resistant, flexible membrane that could encapsulate cells or organelles -- Read more on ScientificAmerican.com

NPR's Robert Siegel speaks with Roger Cukierman, president of the Council of French Jewish Institutions. They discuss the climate in France following last month's attack on a kosher supermarket in Paris, and an appeal by Israel's prime minister for French Jews to emigrate to Israel.

Many philosophers argue in favour of the welfare of animals because of their capacity for feeling pain. Harvard philosopher Christine Korsgaard is unusual in using Kantian arguments to defend the status of animals as ends in themselves. She discusses her approach with Nigel Warburton in this episode of the Philosophy Bites podcast.

We've collected a range of answers to the question 'Who's the most impressive philosopher you've met?' This includes the late Ronald Dworkin's response along with many others. Some of the answers are expected, but quite a few are suprising.

What is probability? Not an easy question to answer. We thought our best chance of clarity on this question was from Emeritus Professor of Philosophy at Cambridge University and author of a book on the subject, Hugh Mellor...

In this episode of the Philosophy Bites podcast Nigel Warburton interviews the philosopher and novelist Rebecca Newberger Goldstein about whether Philosophy has made any progress since the time of Plato. If you enjoy Philosophy Bites, please support us on Patreon or via the Paypal links on our blog.

Robert Siegel speaks with regular political commentators EJ Dionne of the Washington Post and Brookings Institution and David Brooks of the New York Times. They discuss U.S.-Iran policy and the upcoming speech of Israel's Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Rachel Martin reviews the week in politics with our regular commentators, E.J. Dionne of The Washington Post and Brookings Institution and David Brooks of The New York Times. They discuss the Department of Homeland Security funding debate, the authorization of force against the Islamic State and same-sex marriage in Alabama.

As Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton used a personal email address when conducting official business rather than using a government address. What impact will the disclosure have on Clinton's reputation as she considers a presidential bid?

The president's signature accomplishment — the Affordable Care Act — faces yet another critical test. On Wednesday the Supreme Court will hear arguments on whether Congress intended for the federal health insurance exchange to offer the same subsidies available to those in state exchanges.

Yeah, fantasy sports are fun, especially when you can bag on your old college buddies about their dumbfounding transactions. And it’s even better when you can take some of their cash while you’re at it. But fantasy sports have real, practical applica...

Newly appointed commissioner of Major League Baseball, Robert Manfred, spoke at the Sloan Sports Analytics Conference in Boston today. He was interviewed by ESPN personality Brian Kenny and covered just about every topic you can think of in baseball....

Betting MLB Spring Training is right up there with eating that week-old slice of pizza at the back of your fridge and lending your car to that sweet girl with the tramp stamp you met at the bar last night (she said she had to pick up her aunt from th...

Spring has sprung at the sportsbooks where MLB season win totals have been on the board for more than a week. We talk to bookmakers in Nevada and online to see which teams have garnered the most action on their season projections and the subsequent a...

Do you want to read a lede about who the Westgate Las Vegas SuperBook has favored to hit the most home runs in the 2015 MLB season, or do you want to see Marc McGwire sock a few dingers? If you answered with dingers, this video is for you:

With Adrian Peterson officially being reinstated into the NFL, speculation has already became rampant as to where the star running back will end up next season. Though the Minnesota Vikings still retain the rights to AP, there has been speculation th...

CG Technology, which operates such books as the Venetian, M Resort, Tropicana and Cosmopolitan, was first out of the gate when they hung their season win numbers last week – the earliest we’ve ever seen these futures available. We turned those odds o...

CG Technology, which operates such books as the Venetian, M Resort, Tropicana and Cosmopolitan, was first out of the gate when they hung their season win numbers last week – the earliest we’ve ever seen these futures available. We turned those odds o...

NFL betting is a 12-month event, not just reserved to 17 weeks, as evidenced by CG Technology releasing 2015 NFL season win totals last week – the earliest the Nevada sportsbook operator has ever posted the futures odds.

With the NFL Combine over and the franchise tag period hitting the world of football, CG Technology has released their odds for NFL divisional winners for the upcoming season. Most of the odds are predicated heavily on last season' results, but if yo...

8 Comments

Very interesting. This is like alternate history stuff, a subject I always found interesting in the SF genre. But, as Steven King made clear in his last novel, “11/22/63″, you can’t change just one factor and then accurately predict the ramifications of it. It’s the butterfly effect. If those crucial legislative actions had not occurred, I would like to think the effects would have been so deleterious to the country that some other processes would have ameliorated their lack. But, who knows? Horrendous things are possible, aren’t they? The USSR, Nazi Germany, North Korea. Makes me want to vote all over again. :smile:

King Beauregard

Hey, I can actually make an Armistice-Day-appropriate observation! I sometimes call World War One “The War of the Baloney Sandwich”, because the whole thing could have been defused with a baloney sandwich.

You see, back in the day, the Austro-Hungarian Empire was run by Emperor Franz Josef, a massive tool who didn’t care how oppressed the various peoples under his control were. But the heir apparent was one Archduke Ferdinand, who had visions of greater liberties for the various peoples, and who even once drew up a map of a proposed United States of Greater Austria. He saw that the world was changing, and ruling with an iron fist was no longer the way to go.

However, certain Serbians got it into their heads that it would be a good idea to assassinate Archduke Ferdinand, so they crossed the border into the empire and stationed themselves in Sarajevo. Well, these were Inspector Clouseau-grade assassins. The first group of assassins threw a bomb at Ferdinand’s car; it bounced off the car and into a crowd, where it hurt some bystanders. Ferdinand stopped the car to help, because he was a pretty good guy. The would-be assassins panicked, and jumped into the river to either escape or drown themselves; but since it hadn’t rained in a while, the water was maybe only knee deep. So they chomped down on their cyanide pills, which didn’t work, and just gave them stomach aches. Archduke Ferdinand, meanwhile, went on to deliver a speech in downtown Sarajevo.

That left Gavrilo Princip, who was stationed elsewhere during the bombing attempt. He heard about the attempt’s failure, and decided to get lunch at a cafe. As he was eating, who should drive around the corner but Archduke Ferdinand, done with his speech and ready to go home. The car had made a wrong turn; the driver tried to reverse the car, the car stalled, and while the driver was trying to start the car, Princip (a notoriously bad shot) was able to just walk up to the car and shoot Archduke Ferdinand.

Well, we all know what happened next: Austria pinned it on Serbia and trumped it up into an excuse for invasion, Austria and Serbia both enlisted all their allies (the major colonial powers) to slug it out, and because everyone felt they were just defending themselves, there was really no good point at which to decide that the war’s aims had been achieved, until one side or the other was too exhausted to fight any longer.

But just imagine if you, possessing a time machine, could have stood there on Franzjosefstrasse, handing out free baloney sandwiches when Princip was feeling a mite peckish. What might have changed? Well, Archduke Ferdinand would have taken the throne and granted much greater autonomy to the ethnic minorities in his empire. The Balkans most likely wouldn’t have been a permanently peaceful place, but the conflicts there might not have spilled out to the rest of the world. And while wars between the various great powers were inevitable, maybe they wouldn’t have been all-encompassing wars that touched every continent except Antarctica.

King Beauregard

I subscribe to the theory that World War One proves the existence of time travel. That whole story I laid out is utterly ridiculous; if I’d put it into a work of fiction nobody would publish it. But it really happened, so I submit that there must be two teams of time travelers at work; here is how the timelines worked.

Original timeline: Serbian marksmen assassinate Archduke Ferdinand efficiently. World War One happens.

Variant timeline A: Idealists in the 22nd century travel back in time to 1914, give the original team of assassins the flu. Alternate team of much less competent assassins attempts to shoot Archduke Ferdinand, and fails miserably. Relative peace prevails. Time Travel Team A leave themselves an encrypted note carved on a stone tablet, instructing their future selves on what they have to do to preserve the peace they are so accustomed to (build a time machine, buy some flu, etc).

Variant timeline B: Prime Directive-y time travelers in the 22nd century also decrypt the stone tablet and decide the original timeline must be restored. They are at odds with Time Travel Team 1, so they wait until Time Travel Team 1 has set up the new team of assassins, and Time Travel Team 2 arms the assassins with a bomb. The assassination works. Time Travel Team 2 carves a different stone tablet because time loop.

We are clearly living in Variant Timeline F. This will keep going on until one team or the other accidentally reinstates the conditions of the original timeline, and the whole set of timelines will just keep looping.

Oh, yeah? What happens if a Time Travel Team with a death wish travels back in time and literally pisses in the primordial soup? Huh? My guess is that Sarah Palin would be president under that scenario.